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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/30085755">A First Foray into True Friendship</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/freyja_luna/pseuds/freyja_luna'>freyja_luna</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Padfoot and Prongs: An Anthology [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bad Parent Orion Black, Bad Parent Walburga Black, Best Friends, Bullying, Friendship, Gen, Hogwarts First Year, Male Friendship, Marauders, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Marauders Friendship (Harry Potter), POV Sirius Black, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Prompt Fic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 11:14:10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,404</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/30085755</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/freyja_luna/pseuds/freyja_luna</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sirius hadn’t had a best friend until he got to Hogwarts, let alone such a good one like James. Whether it’s making mischief or taking Snivellus down with a bewitched carpet, twelve-year-old Sirius knows that James will show him what true friendship is, and that they’ll explore this whole new world together.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Sirius Black &amp; James Potter, Sirius Black &amp; Remus Lupin &amp; Peter Pettigrew &amp; James Potter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Padfoot and Prongs: An Anthology [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2190093</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A First Foray into True Friendship</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition on ff. net<br/>Round 2: Once Upon a Song<br/>Position: Chaser 1<br/>Team: Ballycastle Bats<br/>Prompt: A Whole New World from the Disney movie Aladdin<br/>Optional prompt used:<br/>2. (word) solidarity</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Shh! You’re going to give us away.”</p>
<p>“Don’t ‘shh’ me.”</p>
<p>“D’you want to get Snivellus or not?”</p>
<p>“I do, but you ought to—”</p>
<p>“SHH!”</p>
<p>I started shoving James in our hidden alcove. “I told you to stop shushing me!”</p>
<p>He giggled loudly when I nearly knocked him into a nearby suit of armour. “Oi! Lay off me, you brute!”</p>
<p>“Stop shushing me, then,” I said as we came tumbling out from our hiding spot and into the darkened corridor. </p>
<p>Someone cleared their throat loudly, the only other sound to break the silence besides me and James. </p>
<p>We stopped our horseplay and turned to face our target. “Good evening, Snivellus,” James said, and we both burst out laughing. </p>
<p>Snape folded his arms across his chest, trying to look tough. “You’ve been spying on me, haven’t you?”</p>
<p>“We were just checking to see if you’d taken a shower, Snivellus,” I drawled, making James crack up again. </p>
<p>“Trying to spy on me in the loo now?” Snape spat. Despite his brave words, he pulled on a limp strand of dark hair in embarrassment. </p>
<p>“D’you need help wiping your arse, Snivellus?” James said and we high-fived, the sound cracking like gunshots. </p>
<p>“Bold of you to ask what I’m doing in the loo, you sick bastard. Aren’t you enough of a sneaking, spying pervert with Evans?” Snape shot back, his face twisted in anger. </p>
<p>“Spying?” I said in a high-pitched girly voice. “We don’t spy and sneak, Snivellus, <em> you </em>do.”</p>
<p>His face flushed and he clenched his fists next to his sides. “Shut your face, Black.”</p>
<p>“Make me,” I said, casually withdrawing my wand. </p>
<p>“’Bout time we do to Snivellus what we planned to, yeah?” James said to me. </p>
<p>“You do the honours,” I replied with a grin. </p>
<p>James waved his wand and the nearest tapestry tore itself from its hanging and launched itself at Snape, and it was soon joined by the decorative carpet hanging on the other wall which hid a secret passage that James and I had found. </p>
<p>Snape yelled as the tapestry wrapped around his body, while the carpet landed on his head in an attempt to smother him. James and I howled with laughter as Snape’s cries were muffled under the weight of his assailants. </p>
<p>“Wicked spell, mate,” I said.</p>
<p>“I know!” He ruffled the top of his head. </p>
<p>“YOU LITTLE BUGGERS!” </p>
<p>James and I looked behind us to see Filch hobbling towards us as fast as his gnarled, arthritic legs could carry him, with Mrs. Norris trotting to keep pace. We took off down the hall, laughing hysterically despite the threats Filch was yelling after us about how he would be putting his chains to good use. </p>
<p>“Merlin’s beard!” James wheezed as we took cover in an empty classroom a few floors up. “We’ve got to use that on Snivellus again. Did you see his face when the carpet flew towards him?”</p>
<p>I pushed away some hair that had fallen into my face with our sprint. “Bloody hell, that was wicked. I never thought it’d be this fun to be in Gryffindor.”</p>
<p>James abruptly stopped laughing and looked at me. “Whaddya mean?”</p>
<p>I shrugged. “Just the way everyone talked to me about Gryffindor, like it was terrible or…”</p>
<p>“A tenement house?” he offered. </p>
<p>I burst out laughing. “What in Merlin’s name is that?”</p>
<p>He shrugged and laughed too. “Dunno, I heard Dad say it once.”</p>
<p>I thought about something for a moment. “Dad told me not to make friends with ‘your kind’ before I came to Hogwarts. I don’t see why though. We’re great friends.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, well, your dad has rubbish ideas about who you can be friends with. I’m the <em> best </em>sort of friend you could have.”</p>
<p>I grinned. “Yeah, I know you are. Dad and Mum always like to tell me, ‘No’ when I want to make friends with the best people.”</p>
<p>James furrowed his eyebrows. “No offense, mate, they sound annoying. Do they tell you not to go places too?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, loads of times.”</p>
<p>“Pshhh. No more of that.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, it’s like a whole new world at Hogwarts with you and Remus and Peter.”</p>
<p>James raised an eyebrow. “It was really that bad before you met us?”</p>
<p>“Well, yeah. Duh. All the Blacks are mad, don’t you know that?”</p>
<p>He shrugged. “Your lot is rot but you turned out alright, yeah?”</p>
<p>I nodded and picked at a loose thread on my robes. “For the first time…” I paused, struggling to find the right words to express myself. “For the first time, I feel like I have a home at Hogwarts. And I reckon I can’t go back to where I used to be, like…”</p>
<p>“Like back to your house?”</p>
<p>“No, like… not literally? Like I can’t go back to what I was doing before, you know? I’ve come so far.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, makes sense,” James said. He grinned suddenly. “Does that make me the person who has to show you this new world?”</p>
<p>I rolled my eyes and shoved him playfully. “Duh. Who else is gonna? Everyone but you and Remus and Peter are so bloody boring. I don’t want to be friends with anyone else.”</p>
<p>James punched me on the arm in good fun. “We’ll always like having you around, mate.”</p>
<p>I grinned and punched him back, feeling for the first time in my life that a true best friend had my back, and that I had his. Whatever we’d go through, we stand together and face it head-on. </p>
<p>“Besides,” James continued, “Who else is always gonna fancy a late-night prank on greasy old Snivellus?”</p>
<p>I laughed at that. “Remus said he needs his sleep. I mean, honestly? Who needs sleep when you could be pranking Snivellus? Or anyone for that matter.”</p>
<p>“And Peter was too afraid of being caught.” James scoffed. “Come off it, it’s us. We’ll never get caught, he should know that.”</p>
<p>“Never, not when we’re finding all these secret passages.”</p>
<p>He paused with his mouth half-open for a whole minute before he finally spoke. “We should make something that’ll keep track of all the passages! So we don’t forget them.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, but how?”</p>
<p>He shrugged. “Eh, let’s ask Remus tomorrow morning. He’d know.”</p>
<p>“We should ask him now.”</p>
<p>“You fancy getting beaten with a pillow for waking him up? Well, I don’t. Do it yourself, then.”</p>
<p>“Come off it, he’s not that violent.”</p>
<p>“Uh, have you seen him?” James leapt at me and began pretending to whack me over the head with a pillow, while I laughed hysterically. </p>
<p>I held my hands up in a show of goodwill. “Alright, alright! Lay off me, will you?”</p>
<p>James gave me a last amicable shove before falling silent, staring at me earnestly. “Did you never have a best mate before me?”</p>
<p>I shook my head hard. “Nope. And even the friends I had weren’t really all that fun. And they never understood me, you know?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, I know. Same for me, before I met you and Remus and Peter. Mum and Dad said it would be like that though.”</p>
<p>“Like what?”</p>
<p>“That I’d meet my best mates at Hogwarts. And I have.”</p>
<p>“Glad it’s… mutual? Is that the right word?” I said. </p>
<p>“Er, I reckon?”</p>
<p>“Now that I’ve got three best mates,” I said, “it finally feels like there’s fun to be had, like I can have all these great adventures and get up to mischief like never before.”</p>
<p>“What d’you reckon we’ll do when we’re older? Like at Hogwarts?” James asked, pushing his glasses back up his nose. </p>
<p>I shrugged and grinned. “Thrilling and fantastic and bloody wicked things. Who knows? Anything we want, I reckon.”</p>
<p>He laughed before clobbering me with a headlock. “I can’t wait to do it all. There’s loads for us to do out there, but more importantly—”</p>
<p>“‘More importantly’ what? Out with it,” I joked. </p>
<p>“More importantly, we’ll be going on all these adventures and making mischief <em> together </em>, Sirius.”</p>
<p>I smiled at that. For the first time, I had a best friend and a group of friends made up of the four of us, and I knew that they’d be there for me when it really mattered like no one else had been before. I’d be loyal to them too. We’d support each other like we already did, and with them I knew that I could face my mad family and whatever troubles would stand in my way; I was sure of it.</p>
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